Utah Jazz hoping Andrei Kirilenko will pass up World Championships, but AK's unsure

MAITLAND, Fl. — The Jazz are hoping starting small forward Andrei Kirilenko passes on playing in the upcoming FIBA World Championships, but Kirilenko isn't sure what he's going to do.

The Jazz wish Kirilenko won't go to the tourney in Turkey, but Kirilenko — star of the Russian national team — has been pondering the possibility.

"The two sides have discussed the pros and cons of him playing," agent Marc Fleisher said Tuesday, "and Andrei was thinking about it and will presumably make the decision shortly."

The Jazz don't want Kirilenko to play, because of the calf strain he sustained late last season.

Kirilenko missed 15 of Utah's final 17 games of the regular season after experiencing muscle strains and re-strains three different times in three different areas of the same calf.

He also missed all of the Jazz's first-round playoff series against the Denver Nuggets and the first two games of their second-round series with the eventual NBA-champion Los Angeles Lakers.

"He unquestionably, if there was no other of these injuries, wants to play with his national team," Fleisher said.

But the calf situation, Fleisher said, "will be a significant factor" in Kirilenko's decision.

"I think that one of the concerns is that the injury that he had, it happened three times," the agent said. "So, I don't think that's a coincidence. ... We want to make sure it doesn't happen again.

"I know that during the time this was happening, there was a sense that he might have changed his gait a little bit," Fleisher added, "and that's why it happened again."

The Russian newspaper Sovetskii Sport reported that Kirilenko might not play, and according to the Russian state-owned news agency RIA Novosti, the 29-year-old "will probably follow the (Jazz)'s advice in order not to spoil relations with the management in view of a new contract."

His current contract with the Jazz, which pays $17.8 million next season, expires next summer.

Kirilenko led Russia to a surprise EuroBasket title in 2007 and carried Russia's flag at the 2008 Olympics in China.

But he didn't play internationally last summer, when Russia finished a disappointing seventh in EuroCup play at Poland. The reason cited then was family-related, as he and his wife, Masha, were in the process of adopting a baby girl in Russia.